Friday, March 02, 2007

Letter in response to "Unhappy Meals" -- NY Times

Here's the final text of letter I wrote in response to the article below (which was never published): I was impressed by Michael Pollan's recent article on the Americandiet and "nutritionism" ("Unhappy Meals"). I also enjoyed reading theletters that commented on this article in last Sunday's magazine(February 12th issue). That being said, I felt that, taken as awhole, the letters offered a single take on Pollan's piece. Here I tryto offer a somewhat different perspective. Pollan's central thesis --that Americans should move away from a science-based diet and towardeating traditional, more natural foods -- is grounded in theunderlying idea that our bodies are carefully adapted to processnutrients in the context of whole foods. These biochemicaladaptations stem from our development in Africa millions of yearsago. Note, however, that our bodies are adapted to thrive to the ageof reproduction -- not to old age -- on natural foods. The fact thatpeople are living so long now is as unnatural for the human species asPollan's notion of artificial foods, and a number of natural foodsbeneficial to the young and growing are, in fact, completely unhealthyfrom a longevity perspective. Moreover, many of the traditional foodsthat Pollan extols are actually products of man's manipulation; thatis, many of staples of a traditional European diet ("Mom's food") arenot foods that our ancestors would have found grazing on the Africansavanna, but rather are products of the later agricultural andindustrial revolutions. In particular, milk and dairy productsobviously relate to the domestication of animals. Many of the cropsthat we routinely eat, such as corn, have effectively been geneticallyengineered by thousands of years of breeding to be completelydifferent from what they first were. Thus, the original diet thatpeople were biochemically designed for is a far cry from what today'svegetarian or adherent of the Mediterranean diet would eat. Thus, canwe really claim that it is imperative to move away from the humanmanipulation of food?http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/11/magazine/11letters.t-1.htmlhttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html?ex=1327640400&en=a18a7f35515014c7&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rsshttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html?ex=157680000&amp;en=ec2685fd6c213846&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalinkUnhappy MealsBy MICHAEL POLLANPublished: January 28, 2007Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.That, more or less, is the short answer to the supposedly incredibly complicatedand confusing question of what we humans should eat in order to be maximallyhealthy. I hate to give away the game right here at the beginning of a longessay, and I confess that I'm tempted to complicate matters in the interest ofkeeping things going for a few thousand more words....[L2E ]